I was on a farm near Milton Keynes this summer , due to the weather earlier on the grain hadn't filled out to make a good sample and some of the Oil Seed Rape was down on yield ( so I was told ), due to the lack of sun, a neighbour that had been growing sunflowers at the edge of a field for game cover had them waist height when they should have been head height,maize has not grown well as it needs the heat of the sun and there wasn't enough of it.
When it comes to sowing winter crops we had a nearly 200 acres not sown as the ground was too wet as there seemed to be one shower a day, every day and the ground never got a chance to dry enough.
Over 200 acres of OSR will have to be re-sown as it was so slow growing and what did come up was hammered by slugs and as the ground was so damp they stayed under the soil eating the roots of the plants and not going to the surface where the slug pellets were.
I was near Chester for a day and there were numerous fields not combined as the ground was so soft ( you could see where the combines had been getting stuck ) there were quiet a few fields that still had unbaled straw in them ( which would slow things up if they were going to sow it again this season ).
The farm I was on had Pick Your Own Strawberries and they have given up with them as this is the second year that they have been unable to pick any as they are going mouldy on the plant.
I would say straw will be in short supply as the wheat/ barley didnt grow so well as it can do ( less straw) and the rain has spoiled quiet a bit as it was lying on the ground before it was baled in some cases.
A friend outside Inverness was still combining his crops a week ago as it had been so wet earlier on.
However perhaps that was just where I was, maybe it was nice where you were !
What was it like in your area ?

50 years ago when we made hay a year like this would have been a disaster but now that everyone is on silo it's been quite a good crop and well taken. Low lying/badly drained ground is sodden but that's no sweat because most of the cattle are indoors for the winter. Not sure about sheep but I guess they will have had more foot trouble than usual. We will not be short of water!

Stanley Challenger Graham
Stanley's View
scg1936 at talktalk.net

"Beware of certitude" (Jimmy Reid)
The floggings will continue until morale improves!

The fields round us have been wet all year. The dairy farm across the valley only took two cuts for silage instead of the normal three, and they only just managed to cut the barley field with the combine getting bogged down a couple of times. I've got a few bales of last year's hay left for my ponies and I'm not looking forward to finding out how much this year's is going to cost!

Very wet on the fields here. Heard someone was selling large bales of haylage for £60, wheat straw £3 a bale (brought up from near Cambridge!!). I had some small bales left from last year and have managed to get some more, without paying an arm and a leg, though they are last years they are very good.
I suspect there will be a lot of hungry animals about.

Hay is a gamble that's for sure, they have stopped making it up in this part of Wester Ross and just do silage in bags now although they make it over in the Inverness direction where they can have long shadow free days as there are sloping fields that catch the sun ( awful job nowdays trying to get traditional small bales though)
Before I came home the farm manager had been speaking to a chap who samples grain and had been working his way from Lincs to Bedfordshire, at that time folk were sowing wheat and everywhere there was cultivation equipment sat in fields unable to work as it was too wet to go on the fields.

Stanley - I read after the potato famine in 1847 there was a few wet summers and they couldnt ripen or dry their crops, with sheaves of oats standing in the fields getting wetter until they were nearly rotting and the ears nearly growing in some cases, but what could you do if you have nowhere to put it inside. No doubt the price of animals dropped as there was no feed.

Bad summers like that were common and a serious matter. Add the fact that transport was bad and food couldn't be easily imported and you got local famine.
As for two year-old hay, I used to cart it to the racing stables, they didn't want new hay, they much preferred it two years old.

Stanley Challenger Graham
Stanley's View
scg1936 at talktalk.net

"Beware of certitude" (Jimmy Reid)
The floggings will continue until morale improves!